---

  **Narrator:**

  After Elias’s rage erupted, things began to change.

  Things unseen.

  Things misunderstood.

  Events that slowly started to alter reality itself.

  Something Aethron failed to notice.

  And something Elias himself did not yet understand.

  And so, the story continues.

  ---

  ### Three Weeks Later

  Elias could not stop thinking about the child who had died because of him.

  A child whose future he had erased.

  A child who believed in happiness—only for the world to betray it and turn away.

  Within three weeks, hundreds of Marked had fallen.

  Death came swiftly, silently, without question.

  Elias began to sense a change.

  His power was growing.

  Faster than before.

  He felt something eating away at him from within—not pain, but pressure.

  He did not know how strong he had become.

  He did not know what he was capable of.

  So he kept it to himself.

  He wanted nothing more to do with Aethron.

  He knew he had to resist him.

  He simply did not yet know how.

  ---

  ### Four Years Later

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  Years passed.

  Elias, overflowing with the darkness of humanity—its hatred, fear, and cold indifference—moved endlessly from place to place.

  He killed.

  He cleansed.

  Like a machine.

  Gradually, he lost any memory of what the word *happiness* meant.

  The only things he understood were death, rage, and aggression.

  These became the core of his existence.

  Now he knew—his power had grown at an extreme rate.

  Plants near him withered faster than ever before.

  When approaching a Marked target, he no longer needed to stop.

  It was enough to pass through a shadow nearby.

  The task was complete.

  Soon, he noticed another change.

  He no longer needed to be close.

  Simply being within a radius of **two hundred forty meters** was enough.

  Then something happened that shook him.

  His presence began killing the unmarked.

  Animals.

  Insects.

  Even humans with fragile health.

  Elias realized he was absorbing the thoughts of those who were never meant to be targets.

  It took him time to understand.

  His existence itself had become death to all living things nearby.

  The closer he was to life, the faster it faded.

  And then he remembered.

  The reason he had accepted the offer long ago.

  He wanted to protect the innocent.

  He wanted to punish the wicked.

  The moment he realized this, he stopped.

  And then—it happened.

  ---

  The First Resistance

  For the first time, he **refused to move**.

  For the first time, he halted his own body on the path toward a Marked target.

  The first trace of freedom.

  Aethron noticed immediately.

  One of his Messengers was resisting.

  *I cannot allow this,* he thought.

  He used his power of manipulation to force Elias into obedience.

  Nothing happened.

  Elias did not move.

  The pain caused by resistance was unbearable.

  But his will to protect the innocent was stronger than any command.

  Unknowingly, his aura did not bring merely death.

  It brought **the end of existence itself**.

  His aura tore chains apart.

  It shattered the binding that allowed Aethron control.

  The bonds collapsed.

  And Elias became free.

  Angry.

  And turned against Aethron.

  Elias still did not understand what his aura truly was.

  He believed it only caused death.

  He had no idea what awaited him.

  ---

  **Narrator:**

  And so, after many long years, Elias became free once more.

  He gained the power to take matters into his own hands.

  But will he succeed?

  And what will Aethron do when he realizes that his control is slipping away?

  That will be revealed in the story to come.

  ---